The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood

“Gleick's history of how humans learned to store and transmit information — from African drums to Claude Shannon's theorems — is the kind of deep-time framing Andreessen gravitates toward. He has cited it as essential for understanding why software is categorically more powerful than prior general-purpose technologies.”

“James Gleick's history of information, from African drums to Shannon's formalization of entropy. Collison is drawn to books that trace the long prehistory of what now seems obvious, and this is one of the best at that.”

“James Gleick's history of information — from African drums to Claude Shannon — touches on every domain Brand has inhabited: communication, computing, ecology. Brand has cited Gleick's work repeatedly; this book traces the invisible medium that makes everything else in the list possible.”